“I think it would be better to call the peacekeepers and a doctor, but you must get out of here before that.”

However, a butler couldn’t keep his job if he kept asking questions to his mistress.

“Oh, right. Tatiana is in the next room.”

“Miss Chartle is here?”

Carl really couldn’t help but sound confused. Miss Chartle was known to be reserved and calm, so what was she doing here?

But yet again, he suppressed his curiosity and went to the adjacent room to get Tatiana.

“My, how did you get that?”

However, even he couldn’t help but ask when seeing the eavesdropping device in the middle of the room.

“Oh, um, I bought it.”

“You bought it? Are you saying your family bought it?”

“No, I saved my allowance to buy it.”

However, the device costs far more than most lords’ domains. Carl was silent for a moment while all kinds of questions were swarming in his mind.

“Anyway, you must leave, now.”

One thing he could be sure of was that she was going to be in big trouble if the king got to find out about this. However, to his surprise, Tatiana shook her head.

“I’m staying, someone has to take responsibility.”

Then, she pointed at the device.

“I stopped recording after the duchess and Gabriel ran out. I cannot write an article about a tempered situation.”

“Tatiana…”

Gabriel looked at her, unsure of what to feel. She didn’t regret the choice she made, but she felt sorry for Tatiana.

“Please don’t be like that. I’m not writing an article with this, but I’m not throwing it away either.”

“Then…”

“I’m going to hand the recording to the peacekeepers as soon as they get here, and I will imply in my next article that I have a recording of what happened today.”

Tatiana smiled broadly. She looked quite mischievous and Gabriel had to laugh with her. Still, it felt unfair to let her take all the responsibility. Wasn’t she supposed to stay with her?

Tatiana saw what she was thinking and shook her head.

“You idiot, you should go. Even if I stay here, I can say I was helping with my father’s work to report, and the king will understand, but what would happen to you?”

“I can keep my mouth shut, and he won’t be able to find out that I snuck into his palace.”

“Don’t forget he’s a genius in making people confess the truth.”

“But…”

Gabriel was very worried about her friend, but Tatiana patted her hand to calm her down.

“Don’t worry. The king will have to risk a lot to punish me for this.”

“Risk a lot?”

“I can’t tell you more, it’s my family’s secret.”

Tatiana replied quite pleasantly. It seemed like House Chartle knew something about the king that the world didn’t know about.

It was the power of a newspaper company that had many reporters and sources. Even men of power at court couldn’t mess up with Chartle.

“Send me a letter anytime if you need my help.”

“Thank you, Your Grace.”

Rubica and Gabriel said goodbye to her and went downstairs.

Carl had parked the mana stone carriage at the back door instead of parking it at the front, even though he hadn’t known what was going on.

Rubica was quite impressed with how he took care of everything. If they had mounted the carriage at the front door, everyone in the street would have found out they had been there.

“My home is on your way back, could you drop me off?”

Gabriel pleadingly asked as soon as they were on the carriage, but Carl just shook his head.

“The duke has ordered me to bring you in.”

Gabriel recalled the duke’s beautiful but terrifying face and shuddered. She knew once the duke found out what she had done, he wouldn’t let it go easily. She had dragged his wife into danger.

“Your Grace, can’t I go home?”

But even the butler wouldn’t be able to object if the duchess gave her permission. She asked Rubica with hope, but to her surprise, she coldly shook her head.

Rubica loved the girl’s freely way of living her life. However, she really had crossed the line today. It was good that everything had gone well, but if it hadn’t, they would have been killed.

“Why is this carriage so fast?”

Gabriel usually loved the mana stone carriage’s fast speed, but today, she hated it. For the first time, she could relate to the cows being dragged to the slaughterhouse.

However, contrary to her fear, when they arrived at the mansion, Rubica went up to Edgar’s office alone, and she was left in the reception room.

It was good that the duke wasn’t confronting her right away, but waiting there made her even more nervous.

Elise poured her a cup of tea, and she looked at the sky through the window as she took it. The sky was about to turn red soon.

“Umm, it’s getting very late. My parents must be worried. Could you tell His Grace I have to go home?”

“Miss Chartle, you don’t have to worry about that. We’ve already sent a message to your parents. Your father said you can spend the night here.”

Her parents didn’t know what had happened, so they must have been delighted to give her permission to stay at Claymore. Gabriel could almost see her father smiling broadly to hear the news.

‘And when they get to find out what I’ve done, I will get no dessert for a month… no, at least for a year.’

Gabriel feared that even more than being grounded, so she stared at the refreshment she received with the tea. Now wasn’t time to shudder in fear. She didn’t know when she would be able to eat cake again.

Therefore, she forgot about her manners and started to quickly move her fork. Her plate was emptied in no time.

“You must have been very hungry. Do you want some more?”

And of course, Gabriel didn’t say no to Elise’s offer.

“Can I go to the kitchen with you?”

She even boldly asked for more, as she knew if they had a maid do it for them, she would only bring a plate of cookies, sandwiches, and cakes.

Claymore’s chef made better cakes than the king’s chef, so Gabriel didn’t want to waste the space on the plate with cookies and sandwiches.

“Okay…”

“Then let us go!”

She had to eat as much cake as possible before Edgar called her. Gabriel put an arm around Elise’s arm and headed to the kitchen.

“This, this, and that.”

“Don’t you have more peanuts?”

Then, while she was eagerly choosing on pieces of cakes to fill her plate, a man came into the kitchen. She instinctively looked and almost dropped the plate in surprise.

“Huh?”

It was the man she had seen earlier, although his eyes and hair were brown, not gold. Then, he wasn’t an illusion?

However, he had fallen from the second floor. How could he be here? Fear and curiosity swirled together in Gabriel’s mind.

The man didn’t care about her. He just went past her and filled a plate with peanuts. The maids and Elise were used to his behavior and didn’t stop him.

“Um… hey.”

As always, Gabriel became curious. She decided to be brave and talk to him first.

The man turned to her, but then he dropped the plate of peanuts in shock.

“We’ve met earlier, right?”

As soon as she asked that, the man turned around and ran out of the kitchen.

“Oh, he spilled all these peanuts.”

“We should pick them up and give them to the birds.”

Gabriel tried to follow him, but the maids all knelt down to pick up the peanuts, so she couldn’t.

By the time she ran out of the kitchen, the man had already disappeared. She was the one who was surprised to see the same illusion twice, so why was he even more surprised than her?

However, she didn’t wonder that for long. The chef noticed she was in trouble and brought her a huge bowl of ice cream.

The treat made her forget everything about the man.

***

Rubica went up to Edgar’s office alone as the sun hadn’t gone down yet. As soon as she saw Ios reclining on the sofa, she complimented his quick judgment.

“Haha!”

He had just been scolded by Edgar for watching instead of helping in that dangerous situation and then running away, so he was quite glad to be complimented by Rubica for doing so.

Edgar frowned hard while wishing he could punch that stupid dragon’s face, and Ios pouted to see that.

“You lost that arm-wrestling fight.”

“I didn’t lose. I saw your hand almost touch the desk.”

“Huh, but I knocked you out right after that!”

“That was… after I lost my consciousness. It is cheating to count that as a victory.”

“Huh, are you trying to excuse yourself from losing?”

Just like that, their endless quarrel began. As always, Ios was smiling a bit and Edgar looked genuinely mad.